For many years, having a green decking area was the last thing
you wanted.

After months of classic British summertime, somebody would take a lasting look at your much-neglected wooden decking sitting in the corner of your garden and remark that it looked ‘a little slimy’. So with a weary sigh, you’d get up from your favourite chair, fend off a child looking for you to head outside and play with them, and instead spend your time giving the deck a wash, restain and repaint.

Only for all your lovingly applied treatments to wash away
after the supposed scorching August Bank Holiday actually turns out to involve
the tail-end of a tropical hurricane.

Of course, none of this would’ve happened if you had a
composite deck. It’s guaranteed not to warp, created with an anti-slip
material, and will look back to its very best with just a quick blast with the
pressure washer. Not only that, it’s available in a wide range of colours so if
you want green just say the word. Or any other colour you can think of.

But anyway, we’re all a little older and wiser nowadays. It’s
good to be green in modern society. It’s important to take a step back and
think about the environmental impacts of our actions, especially now one of the
world’s most influential men probably thinks that climate change is the latest
option on the brand new Ford Focus.

Despite being a product containing a considerable amount of
plastic, composite decking is actually a highly sustainable, reasonable choice.
But how? Well first of all, you don’t need to use any nasty chemicals to treat
your decking, it’s ultra low maintenance and can be restored with just a bit of
water. A big tick.

Secondly, the materials used to make our composite boards are
carefully sourced. Much, if not all, of the wood and plastic would be useless
in any other scenario so it’s surely better it finds new purpose in your
backyard rather than washing into the sea to end up in some forsaken fish on a
new David Attenborough documentary. Another tick.

Now one of the most obvious reasons a composite deck is more
environmentally friendly than it’s wooden counterpart is that it’ll last a
whole lot longer, usually by about two whole decades (Think back to what you
were doing when The Matrix was released in 1999 to gain some perspective on
that). Tick. But leaving that aside, it’s easy to think that wood is a natural
product and therefore surely more sustainable and sensible than a deck
involving any form of plastic. However, as logical as that seems, you may want
to reconsider.

Plenty of the wood that is used in creating ‘traditional’
decking is sourced from Asia or South America simply because it’s cheaper
there. Not only is deforestation a huge issue – conservationists believe that
over a quarter of the Amazon biosphere will be treeless by 2030 if current
rates continue – but the carbon footprint of transporting the wood all the way
to the UK is really quite significant. There are also concerns
that wooden decking boards that are available in Great Britain right now are
actually made of illegally-sourced hardwood from some of the world’s most
endangered trees. Another swooping tick for composite decking.

So why not call in and put your mind at rest?

At least on one of our green composite decks, there’s no risk
of a slip up, neither physically nor ethically.